Chapter 143
All the basic preparations needed to begin the Northern Expedition—or rather, the campaign to conquer the Jurchens—were complete.
The budget and provisions required for the expedition had all been secured, and the Military Equipment Bureau was continuing to mass-produce gunpowder weapons at a rapid pace.
On top of that, the various workshops in Hanyang were mass-producing hwando sabers, spears, and pyeongon flails, which I had newly proposed and designed...
There would be no particularly urgent matters left until the soldiers conscripted from all eight provinces finished their training.
"My lord, the Right State Councillor."
"Kim Hogun, have you finished all the work assigned to you today?"
"I have drawn up the supply plan without leaving any gaps, and I have also completed all the other necessary administrative work."
"Kim Hogun seems to possess an ability comparable to Xiao He during the reign of Han Gaozu. How did you manage to finish so many tasks so quickly and even draw up a perfect supply plan?"
"Thanks to the voluntary contributions from the officials and merchants, I did not have to worry about the budget, so it was manageable."
Jo Mal-saeng shook his head at the word "manageable."
He then pointed toward Kim Jeongnang, who was sitting at the desk over there, and said,
"That Kim Jeongnang over there does not look as though he finds it manageable."
Kim Jeongnang was in such a state that, with a little exaggeration, he could have been mistaken for a mummy, and in any case, there was not a trace of vitality left in his entire body.
His complexion looked as though, if he closed his eyes in that state, he might never wake up again...
In truth, he had done only about a third as much work as I had, yet he was already in that condition. Was he simply a naturally frail person?
"I can't do any more... Save me... Please save me, Lord Kim Hogun...“
Seeing him like that did make me feel a little sorry for him.
Still, he must have gained an opportunity to grow through this task, so I hoped he would use the experience to become tougher.
In any case, it was true that he had worked hard, so I would put in a good word for him with His Excellency Minister Maeng Sa-seong of the Ministry of Personnel.
I would tell him that Kim Jeongnang was highly responsible and exceptionally capable.
"We should let Kim Jeongnang leave work early today. He appears to have worked himself far too hard."
At the words "leave work," Kim Jeongnang's face visibly brightened.
Then, just like students who feel as though they are about to die from illness while at school, only to experience the miracle of recovering as soon as they are allowed to leave early...
Vitality suddenly returned to Kim Jeongnang's body.
Even his footsteps became as light as feathers.
"I do not work people to exhaustion, Your Excellency. I merely help them make the fullest use of the strength they possess."
"......I am truly relieved that I am not serving under Kim Hogun. And there is something I have been meaning to ask you for a long time. Please, for as long as I live, do not go to Jiphyeonjeon."
Jo Mal-saeng was not the only one. Other ministers said much the same thing.
They all begged me not to go to Jiphyeonjeon while they remained in office.
According to Hwang Hui, the reason I could not go to Jiphyeonjeon was that the officials had earnestly requested that Kim Daebung not be sent there...
Well, to be honest, I did not particularly like the idea of going to Jiphyeonjeon either.
What would it be like to serve as a lecturer at Jiphyeonjeon under the great King Sejong, who would spring out of bed at the mere mention of new knowledge or new fields of learning and eagerly devour every bit of them?
The daily royal lectures would delay my departure from work by at least two hours.
I would also have to prepare for the lectures after returning home, which would increase my actual working hours by three hours compared to leaving work on time.
As if I wanted that.
"I, too, truly have no desire to go to Jiphyeonjeon, so you need not worry about that. And I have one request I would like to make of Your Excellency."
"What is it? If it is a request I can grant, I will do anything I can."
"I would like to go on a covert inspection disguised as a military officer who has just passed the military service examination."
"Are you saying you intend to act as an undercover military inspector? I cannot understand why you are suddenly saying something so bizarre."
"It is because wherever large numbers of people gather, there will always be people looking for opportunities to do bad things."
The army was especially prone to that.
Because it was such a closed organization and reporting wrongdoing was difficult, all sorts of beatings and violence committed to pass the time were easily concealed and brushed aside.
Even more so in the Joseon-era army, would beatings really not occur during free time after training, or on days when there were no drills for the sake of maintaining physical fitness?
The system currently adopted by the Joseon army was close to that of line infantry, so things like "breaking formation" and "failing to follow orders during training" did permit violence to be used according to established rules after at least the minimum procedures had been followed...
But beatings carried out without any specific justification, simply because someone was bored or because a senior disliked a junior for no particular reason, absolutely could not be tolerated.
'Even if one person dies, there is a high chance it will simply be buried without a sound or trace.'
"There are people in this world who create all sorts of absurdities for no reason, beat others, and torment them."
Before Joseon, in Goryeo, there was a custom by which officials who had just taken up a new post harassed those who had passed the civil service examination, or those who had been transferred to a different department, under the pretext of a myeonsinrye initiation ceremony.
The myeonsinrye imposed on those who had just passed the civil service examination was especially severe.
In the case of a department transfer, people were not beaten to the point of death or ordered to do bizarre things...
But those who had passed the civil service examination were often beaten badly enough that they could die if they were unlucky, and were subjected to torrents of abuse, with their tormentors claiming that even uprooting the foundations of their family to provide a feast would not be enough.
Why did they do it? There was only one answer.
Under the pretext of disciplining newcomers, the people doing the tormenting were simply amusing themselves and relieving their boredom.
"There are two ways to eliminate abuses in the army."
"You seem to know more about the army than a military official does."
I have served as an officer before.
And I know about these things because I heard stories from people who had been my classmates in the civil service examination and later served as enlisted soldiers.
"Isn't being broadly knowledgeable a good thing? To continue, there are two ways to eliminate abuses: make the training brutally difficult, or impose extremely severe punishments."
We commonly say this about men who become aroused whenever they see a woman and immediately try to throw themselves at her.
We call them the sort of men who would do it as long as they had the strength to lift a pair of chopsticks.
Those who commit abuses out of boredom or abuse their petty power while intoxicated by it are also the sort who, as long as they have the strength to lift a pair of chopsticks, will eagerly lead the way in committing all sorts of abuses and beatings.
Conversely, if they were left without even enough strength to lift a pair of chopsticks, could those men commit abuses?
'They look as though they are about to die right now. How could they possibly commit abuses?'
That is why there is a saying that units where the training and duties are insanely difficult have no abuses.
But if soldiers are driven that hard, noncombat losses could become enormous, and as many as ten percent of the troops might be lost before even reaching the battlefield.
Therefore, there was only one alternative.
Whenever someone committed an abuse or beat someone, drive the following thought into his head: ‘You will be the first one to die.’
That would not eliminate abuses completely, but it could greatly reduce how often they occurred.
"But from a military official's perspective, abuse occurring in his military camp amounts to an admission that he failed to manage his subordinates. So if I were a military official, I think I would try to cover it up even if someone died. Therefore, even if His Majesty ordered the soldiers not to beat or torment one another privately, it would be useless. They could simply coordinate their stories and make it into 'something that never happened.'"
Jo Mal-saeng's face turned deathly pale.
It would be difficult to imagine people collectively deceiving the king and misleading their superiors—a crime that could result in the extermination of three family lines—just to conceal an abuse in the army.
But in an organization like the army, it could happen quite easily.
That was what made closed organizations so frightening.
"That is why I intend to conduct a covert inspection. I am young, so if I claim to be a military officer who has just passed the examination, won't everyone believe me?"
"It would certainly make you easy for the soldiers to look down on. If you said you were a military officer, they would all assume you were a young scholar serving as an officer through hereditary privilege."
"If I accurately identify what is happening and issue the military officials in that unit a very stern warning, what do you think would happen?"
"Are you planning to threaten to take up an axe?"
"If the problem is not corrected, I will submit a Jibu memorial at Gwanghwamun."
A professor renowned for his knowledge of history once said that a Jibu memorial was like WWE—a political act in which no one's head was actually cut off.
But in Joseon right now, a Jibu memorial meant exactly this.
'Even if I die, I will say this. Kill me, or accept what I say.'
"However, if I merely issue a stern warning and ask them to correct the matter themselves without submitting a military report to His Majesty, every military official in the army will keep a sharp eye out for abuses. They will fear that if the same problem occurs again, something terrible will happen."
"Extreme, but effective."
The reason some rotten officers tried to conceal abuses ultimately came down to one thing.
It was not because they liked the soldier who committed the abuse and wanted to protect him.
Nor was it because they disliked the soldier who had suffered the abuse.
Regardless of the circumstances, the cold truth was that their own promotions and futures mattered more, so they simply tried to cover it up.
Therefore, if they were made to understand that concealing an abuse would instead lead to something horrifying, they would personally set out to kill anyone who committed one in their unit.
That alone would eliminate a considerable number of abuses.
"I will submit a memorial to His Majesty. It will go up without passing through the Seungjeongwon, and if His Majesty grants his approval, you will be able to take sick leave."
My request was approved in no time.
From that point onward, I was no longer Five Guards Commander Kim Daebung, but Junior Ninth-Rank Sayong Kim Jong-sin.